Dracula
Dracula, By Bram Stoker, Adapted by Jason Cobley & Staz Johnson, Classical Comics
"FOUR YEARS of arduous production," related the publisher's press release with regards to this hefty adaptation, but the wait's been worth it, and that's not hype on my part, honest. This goes beyond simply being some credible conversion from one medium to another but takes on board the innovative writing approaches used in the original novel and also applies those within the comic form's vocabulary (literal and visual) to good effect too.
The plot? Oh, come on now. Even those of us who've never read the original book or even watched the countless movie adaptations have an inkling of what it's about: there's this vampire (dude with big fangs, drinks human blood to keep him immortal, or one of the undead if you must) who gets an English bloke called Jonathon Harker to come over to Transylvania to tend to assorted legal affairs.
In doing so, Harker uncovers some of Count Dracula's secrets, and, long-term, pays the price for it. Into that mix throw someone in a lunatic asylum called Renfield who goes from eating bugs to cats, but more the extended family and friends of Harker, notably his fiancé and later wife, Mina.
Dracula comes to England, feasts where he can, converting beautiful young ladies to extend his growing harem of vampires with cleavage but a league of gentlemen - advised at each stage by Van Helsing (a Dutch expert in these matters) - gather to right wrongs.
Along the way there are some great moments of innovative literary plotting that helped define the modern prevalent Gothic style and some moments straight out of a pulp novel too, let's not hesitate in ignoring; but it keeps you guessing as to which way the story will turn before it ends in an inevitable good over evil manner.
Initially I was struck by Staz's art. A friend, it's obvious I know something of his artistic influences, general interests, and attitude towards work. He's got a thing about vampires. I used to think it was just him wanting to draw bad babes with pointy teeth but I later found out he was quite deeply read on the subject and more than familiar with the original Stoker story itself. Add a taste for down-tuned heavy metal of the sort that celebrates the dark and dangerous and you might be quite surprised to find out he's quite an open-faced amenable sort.
A Yorkshire lad he's no doubt been to Whitby Bay once or twice, where the book says Dracula's ship lands. Staz grew up on American comics that back in the day used to arrive in England as ship ballast; we'd get what we could on offer in newsagents, never complete runs like today, but Batman was a favourite (naturally enough eh) and while I've had strong conversations with him in the past about how the work of the late Don Newton appealed to him (it's apparent in much of his work), he was also well aware of Neal Adams' earlier revisionism of the character as a creature of the night, and as such, given the potted comics history we were aware of back then, would also have been aware Adams drew a liberal adaptation of Dracula (with a werewolf and others in tow that the Van Helsing film borrows heavily from) and some of Staz's work within this book takes an Adams like storytelling vein early on in his own visual adaptation: he crops and pans in for extreme reactions, and allows angles for emotional range as much as dramatic effect.
His more common mainstream adventure pacing and placement are in effect too for those who come to this work wishing to see the kind of artist they're more used to in a Marvel or 2000AD. But it's as the story develops further that some real creative changes start resonating through the pages: Staz goes beyond his combined influences, his practiced professionalism and he appears to find inspiration within himself to partially reinvent himself as an artist, taking on board the fact that this isn't just a long comic book but something that's meant to be epic and the visual elements he plays with must reflect that while maintaining one foot in the clarity needed to reach more mainstream readers.
How much of Staz's interpretation is down to Jason Cobley's script adaptation is hard to tell: It's often too hard to evaluate a writer's input on Classical Comics’ versions, and on comparing their Original Text and Quick Text versions it can often be a case of modernising and trimming words for a brisker, easier read on the latter. Well, with the Original Text version of Dracula there are no short measures: it is text heavy, and kudos to Jim Campbell for making the lettering small but readable for my ageing eyes. More so to Jason; because this is one adaptation where you can feel a writer at work.
There's too much going on for someone not to be steering this; the differing narratives Stoker used of diary exerts, differing characters giving their spin on the tale and the actual openness of storytelling required in a comic are all pulled together, along with some keen characterisation, and I really feel Jason's done a great job in achieving this.
Like a pint of Carlsberg, Dracula is probably Classical Comics' best book produced.
For more information on Dracula visit Classical Comics.
Sponsored by Target Media.
